A Musical Interlude
by The-Shepherd's-Daughter
Summary: They say that music soothes all kinds of savage beasts, but the Captain of the HMS Surprise never intended to prove how very true that statement was, especially when he was trying so very hard to enjoy himself. Incidentally, Stephen's watch dog skills are also put to the test. (Slice-of-life, film-verse ficlet)


**A/N:** I was at a intimate little Beethoven concert recently and experienced the same dilemma as our favorite Captain, and from there this little romp was born. Just a little standalone shorty while I work on original stuff 'cuz I missed these two!

As always with any of my works, this is certified slash free.

* * *

Captain Jack Aubrey had spent the entire day looking toward this night with great anticipation, perhaps even to such a degree that one might consider his mood one of giddy excitement. Had his companion not been intimately knowledgeable of the Captain's strange swelling and ebbing of emotions, he might have viewed the man's over-eagerness as very unusual in an officer of His Majesty's Navy, if not strange in itself. To see a man of such large stature bouncing from toe to toe like an impatient child in anticipation, if not to ward against the wind's bitter chill outside of the concert hall, and grinning like a fool would confuse any mature individual. But Stephen Maturin knew better than to think such things and bore his companion's idiosyncrasies with admirable grace.

He too had been just as eager to attend the sonata held at the Beneficial Society's Hall in Portsmouth, for their journey back to friendly waters had been a long, arduous one and he would be certain to enjoy every moment on allied soil. While he enjoyed the benefits for study of both fauna and humanity alike in their travels, enduring the horrors of combat had never set well with him; though Stephen was a Doctor, he was but human, with the frailties that came with such a mortal shell. Alternatively, when Jack caught the scent of battle, his whole being came alive as though it were his life breath, his eyes alight with icy fire and anticipation of the hunt. Stephen merely rolled his eyes heavenward and begin to pray to any deity that might be within earshot.

They had met their equal shortly after assuming patrol off the Spanish seacoast; a great hulking ship-of-the-line that had matched them cannon for cannon, volley for volley, presenting quite a challenge for the _Surprise_ and her captain. As was the wont of _Lucky_ Jack _,_ the Spaniard's mizzen had, after what seemed like an age of close combat, groaned its dying breath and heaved into the roiling sea, but not before their cannon and swivel fire had upset the _Surprise's_ taffrail and top deck into a mass of flying wooden daggers which met their marks with deadly accuracy. The enemy, cornered like a wounded beast, had attacked blindly one last time before limping back to where she had come, leaving the _Surprise_ to shroud herself in the gathering evening mists and tend her wounds.

Stephen had feared the worst when Jack had stumbled into the sick bay just after the order to cease fire had been called out; his fear of one day having to sew up his friend like he had done his fellow shipmates becoming a real possibility when his gaze had taken in the great mass of crimson red spreading down the man's sleeve. Lieutenant Pullings had been following directly on his heels, herding Jack forward when he protested and depositing the man unceremoniously onto the Doctor's table; all the while attempting, breathlessly, to explain the nature of the Captain's injury. An enemy musket ball had found its mark in Jack's well-fleshed upper arm and, in a great act of mercy, passed through as it mustered on. The injury had not threatened their captain's life, and for that Stephen would be profoundly grateful, but the sanctitude of their sanity on the journey back to Portsmouth was an entirely different matter.

Never did there exist a worse patient than Jack Aubrey...

Said patient now cursed the sling that chaffed against his neck as they stood outside the Society Hall, feeling anew the restriction of the thrice-damned contraption holding his arm to his chest like a vice. He hated the sensation of being trapped, in any capacity, and all efforts to tug and pull on the offending cloth to loosen its hold brought no relief. Gazing longingly toward his friend and physician elicited no sympathy from the man standing at his side, but instead he received a look that suspiciously resembled an exasperated mother glaring at her petulant child. The wind nipped at their heels and sent Jack's thick boat cloak whipping wildly around his ankles, heightening the anticipation that welled within him - the anticipation of an evening spent in agreeable, amiable companionship, with good music and, most of all, a warm evening spent indoors where no roiling, winter sea leaked through the floorboards. Though he loved his ship like a good, faithful woman, he could not deny the comforts of dry land this night.

When doors of the hall had at last been thrown open to receive their shivering forms, the two men eagerly settled into their seats, one a bit less gracefully than the other when the chain of his cloak caught on the sling encasing his arm, causing a string of curses better suited to the quarter deck of a frigate than polite society to spew from his lips before his companion snatched the offending garment away and shushed the grumbling man into his seat; a few sour looks had been thrown toward the two of them in the interim, but Jack was too preoccupied with complaining to the Doctor and Stephen retained too much good grace to be offended.

"God love you, Stephen," Jack wheezed loudly in the man's ear as he tried to rearrange his dress jacket with only one arm. "this thing's hardly an instrument of healing. It appears to me more of a torture device!"

It was in that same moment that the musicians had arranged themselves on the stage and the first of Boccherini's sonatas began to drift across the masses assembled there, causing some more irritable members to hush Jack's grumbling with harsh whispers. But luckily for Stephen, who feared his companion's irascible temper of late might make an appearance with all the chastisement he was receiving, Jack's good humors were quick to return to him - the broad grin reappearing after only a momentary disappearance when the first few melodic notes floated across the hall.

The Doctor soon found himself quickly lost in the piece as well, for it was easy to be captivated by the heavenly tones rolling from the violinist's strings with such ease. Perhaps it was fortunate that the movement was so engrossing, for the Doctor could not be annoyed by the habitual tapping of Jack's foot in time with the stroke of the violinist's bow against the strings. The two men, each enthralled in their own way, found themselves forgetting the other's presence entirely - as truly artistic expression should do.

It was after the musicians had thrown themselves into the lilting third sonata that Jack began to wonder to himself if the white candles burning bright all around them were suddenly going dim, for the darkness was creeping around the edges of his vision as though each candelabra were being snuffed out one by one; his eyelids suddenly felt as though they were each being weighed down by an eighteen-pounder. The warmth radiating from his friend's side - so odd that Stephen should be so generously warming for how thin and pale he was - began to seep into Jack's very bones and muddle his thinking.

An enigma indeed, for sitting so close to other human forms on either side had certainly warmed Jack to his core, as though he were swaddled up in a down-stuffed bed. He became suddenly aware that Sleep was singing her siren lullaby in time with pluck of the cello and the singing of the violin, catching the Captain completely unaware of its presence before it had already pounced upon his eyelids. He bargained that he might enjoy the piece more fully if he closed his eyes, flooding his gaze with darkness so that nothing else might distract him. Surely there would be no harm in that...

Stephen, however, could not pry his gaze away from the violinist, for there was no doubt in his mind - she was mesmerizing. With each pluck of the delicate strings, the heavenly tones reverberated around the hall, soothing the hearts and souls of every occupant in the room, her face showing transparently every emotion that overcame her as she played. With each listener brought to a singular mind by the lovely tones she coaxed from the great instrument, a collective hush had descended upon those gathered there – a particular stillness overcoming Maturin himself, as though her skill alone was the balm for his weary soul. Nothing save of apocalyptic proportions could lift the spell she had cast upon him.

But to one fellow listener sitting behind him, an apocalyptic scenario was being played out in that same moment, a most dire situation indeed; and he was quick to pounce upon the poor, unsuspecting Doctor to make that fact known to him.

It began with a harshly whispered _pssst_ that was intended to pull Stephen from the violin's enchantment and back into reality, but the attempt was unsuccessful - for the Doctor was entirely oblivious to all else around him. The man, patience completely exhausted after only one attempt, for that was all his small mind was able to put forth, resorted to stabbing Stephen maniacally in the shoulder with his index finger as though he were hammering in a nail. After a few moments of this, Stephen was finally dredged from his reverie, awakening with mild annoyance at who would dare to pull him away from such a lovely, otherworldly spell.

"You there! I say - you!"

"Eh? _What,_ " Stephen growled at the harsh whispering voice in his ear. Turning then he beheld an unpleasant, ruddy faced individual scowling with great red jowls from the seat behind him. The man then turned the same accusatory finger on Jack sitting beside him when he had captured the Doctor's attention at last. The jowls, flushed with emotion, quivered with righteous indignation.

"Either silence that fool or take him away! I will not tolerate such distractions!"

Baffled by the strange allegations placed on his companion, who loved such great artfulness in music as dearly as he and was surely finding this a similarly captivating experience, Maturin turned to steal a glance at his friend and captain to see what the fuss could possibly be about. What his gaze beheld instantly brought a swelling of fondness surging into his chest, if not a renewed sense of anger that the belligerent menace of a man might actually insist he disturb his friend.

Jack was fast asleep, bless him, swaddled arm tucked across his chest like a bird favoring its broken wing. His chin touched his swelling and ebbing breast, causing soft snores to escape from his lips every time he breathed the deep inhalations of contented, restoring sleep; his shoulders were hunched forward like the _Surprise's_ sails when no winds blew across the open sea to fill them. He looked so peaceful sitting there, completely oblivious to the distractions and ill-temper his snuffling was causing, that Stephen was again reminded of all they had survived in those recent days. How grateful he was, that his friend was sitting beside him very much alive with an injury that would mend, that most of them had made it home to loved ones near and far; life seemed such a gift to Stephen Maturin in that moment, and to see Jack with similar peace-of-mind as he relaxed enough to rest beside him, brought a wholehearted contentedness to spread through him to his very toes.

Unfortunately, the Doctor's feelings of goodwill were not reciprocated by the pompous, shallow man sitting behind him, who was attempting to stare daggers into the back of Stephen's head as he wheezed in barely controlled rage. How dare this sickly, long-nosed, fellow ignore a direct command! Had he no propriety, no decency? Did his companion's cursed snoring not violate such a sacred gathering? Yet this man did not even dare to raise a finger to silence the great hog! Truly, if a man wanted something done, he must do it himself; the Frenchman was indeed right about _that!_

The quiet snores emanating from Jack's slumped form were mere whispers compared to the great shout that proceeded from behind Stephen when, as a hand snaked around his shoulders with that cursed finger outstretched, intending to jab the Captain into wakefulness so that its owner might also give Jack a piece of his mind, that the Doctor's predatory reflexes awakened themselves with animalistic agility.

Snatched in a vice-like grip by the cold, thin hand, the finger was stilled, causing the ruddy face of its owner to blossom into a deep shade of pink as he gave a yelp of surprise, the bulging eyes of the tortured man coming to rest on a pair of blue gazing directly into his soul, warning him of the consequences should he even attempt to act on those intentions. The offending mouth opened to form a silent "O" before it was clamped shut with nary a sound, protests dying upon his lips as he beheld the icy fire in the Doctor's gaze, challenging him to speak a word if he dared.

The hand was released as quickly as it had been captured, the offended party slinking as far back into the seat of his chair as his great girth would allow; it was then that Stephen became aware that the sonata was reaching its finale, the violin rising high in a crescendo of melodic tones, causing Jack to snuffle a sigh of contentment from beyond the realm of sleep and dreams. Hearing the happy sound escape his stoic companion's chest, Stephen smiled toward the direction of his friend, patting the arm beside him in amiable fondness.

And when the violinist had raised her bow high with her last plying of the strings, the hall rose as one great creature to applaud with reckless abandon, Stephen felt himself drawn with them as he showed his appreciation for the talents they had been gifted to hear that night. Fearing that the great noise would surely wake his friend and captain from his repose, Stephen quickly cocked an eye toward the man in anticipation of the start that would surely come. His worries had been needless, however, for the man's head merely lolled to the side to signal his final surrender to complete oblivion.

 _Dream on, my friend…_

 _Fin_


End file.
